RUNDOWN:
18:00     Registration
18:15     Opening Remarks
18:20     Presentation
18:30     Moderated Panel Discussion
19:10     Q&A
19:25     Closing Remarks
19:30     Book Signing
19:40     End

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How pervasive is anxiety in our modern societies, among individuals, and in communities? What accounts for the rapid increase in its prevalence? How should we think about anxiety, and what can we do about it?  In Anxiety Culture: The New Global State of Human Affairs, Dr. John Allegrante of Teachers College, Columbia University, Raphaël Liogier, of the Institute for Advanced Studies (UM6P, Morocco) and other contributors contemplate the forces that increase anxiety in populations around the world and pervade global culture.

Join Asia Society Hong Kong Center to hear from Dr. Allegrante, Dr. Liogier, Emily McCarren, Executive Head of School of Keystone Academy in Beijing, and Dr. Po Yang, Chair, Department of Education Economics and Administration, Graduate School of Education, Peking University, in conversation with Edith Shih, as they discuss anxiety as a global phenomenon, what they have learned while producing this book, how students are affected by anxiety, and what educational institutions are doing to adapt.

Dr. John Allegrante, PhD, LHD (Hon.) is the inaugural Charles Irwin Lambert professor of health behavior and education at Teachers College, Columbia University, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1979 and has served as department chair, deputy provost, and associate vice president for international affairs. He has held appointments in sociomedical sciences at the Mailman School of Public Health and in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Columbia, and has been a visiting professor at several universities in Europe and Asia. An applied behavioral scientist, Dr. Allegrante’s research has focused on investigating new approaches to understanding, predicting, and intervening on the barriers and facilitators of behavioral self-management of chronic diseases. He is a co-founder of the Anxiety Culture research project.

A philosopher and sociologist, Raphaël Liogier is Professor at the UM6P in Morocco, and in France at Aix-Marseille University. He is the scientific director of the Institute for Advanced Studies and the head of the Chair of Transitions at the UM6P.  He has been a visiting scholar at numerous universities, including the University of Varanasi (India) and Louvain la Neuve (Belgium). He has published extensively on the changes in human identities and beliefs linked to globalization, the internet, AI and transhumanism. His latest book, Khaos. La promesse trahie de la modernité, argues that our collective anxiety, which prevents us from seeing the future in a positive light, stems from the repression of the real, positive meaning of modernity in the form of materialism and nihilism.

Emily McCarren is the Executive Head of School of Keystone Academy in Beijing, China. Previously, Emily was the Academy (9-12) Principal at the Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi. Emily has taught high school Spanish, math, and science in Switzerland, California, and Hawai’i. She holds masters degrees in Spanish Literature and Educational Leadership from St. Louis University and Columbia University, and a PhD in Learning Design and Technology from the University of Hawaiʻi. Emily is a co-author of the series Take Action Guides to World Class Learners (Corwin, 2016) and served on the board of the Global Online Academy.  Emily is passionate about educational change and the moral imperative to provide students with the schools they deserve and the world needs.

Po Yang is Chair and Associate Professor of the Department of Education Economics and Administration in the Graduate School of Education at Peking University.  She holds a PhD in education economics from the Teachers College of Columbia University.

Edith Shih is an Executive Director and Company Secretary of CK Hutchison Holdings Limited. She has been with the group for over 35 years, in charge of legal, regulatory, compliance and corporate governance affairs of the group, with operations in over 50 countries and about 320,000 employees worldwide. As company secretary of the group, she oversees the compliance work of about 2,000 legal entities worldwide, with over 15 companies listed at 8 stock exchanges. Shih is a solicitor qualified in England and Wales, Hong Kong and Victoria, Australia and a Fellow of both the Chartered Governance Institute and Hong Kong Chartered Governance Institute. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree (Music Education) and a Master of Arts degree (Education) from the University of the Philippines and a Master of Arts degree (Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages) and Master of Education degree (Applied Linguistics) from Teachers College, Columbia University. Her current public service on the education front includes Trustee of the Board of Teachers College, Columbia University, Council Member of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Governor of the Hong Kong English Schools Foundation, Council Member of the Chartered Governance Institute and Honorary Advisor of the Hong Kong Chartered Governance Institute.  In recent years, she spends considerable efforts on sustainability initiatives, focusing on climate change, employee well-being, succession planning and innovation.  

About Anxiety Culture: The New Global State of Human Affairs:

A collection of timely essays on the rising wave of anxiety in culture.

The twenty-first century is characterized by uncertainty: from catastrophic climate change to the accelerating pace of technological change, societies around the world are gripped by anxiety about the future. In Anxiety Culture, editors John Allegrante, Ulrich Hoinkes, Michael Schapira, and Karen Struve bring together a distinguished group of international scholars to examine the forces that increase anxiety as a phenomenon beyond solely individual experiences of clinical anxiety to pervade global culture.

These trenchant essays examine our culture of anxiety across diverse avenues of society. Covering fears related to climate change, populist and extremist movements around the world, gun violence, artificial intelligence, and more, contributors also examine how anxiety is expressed in literature and the media and how a culture of anxiety affects policymaking. Chapters are organized into five sections: disciplinary perspectives on anxiety, climate change and the environment, population health and social well-being, migration, and technology.

There's room for hope, however. Contributors provide pragmatic recommendations for coping with anxiety culture in public education, governments, and NGOs. Anxiety Culture is a unique attempt to define this condition and an indispensable resource for those seeking stability in an unstable age, providing a set of conceptual and practical narratives for navigating both existing and emergent planetary challenges.

Contributors: Kristina Allgoewer, Bryndis Asgeirsdottir, John Baldacchino, Christine Blaettler, Michel Bourban, Dominic Boyer, Eva J. Daussà, Nicholas Freudenberg, Monica van der Haagen-Wulff, Kelsey Hudson, Karena Kalmbach, Emmanuel Kattan, Markus Lemmens, Eric Lewandowski, Raphaël Liogier, Roman Marek, Christian Martin, Paul Mecheril, Angelika Messner, Caine C. A. Meyers, Julie Mostov, Dirk Nabers, Frauke Nees, Konrad Ott, Sonali Rajan, Julie Reshe, Bàrbara Roviró, Renata Selecl, Inga Dora Sigfusdottir, Frank Stengel, Ingibjorg Eva Thorisdottir, Maren Urner, Iris Wieczorek, Zhao Xudong, Liya Yu

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The views and opinions expressed are those of the speakers and participants and, unless expressly stated to the contrary, do not reflect the opinion, position or official policy of Asia Society Hong Kong, its members, or its committees. Asia Society Hong Kong does not endorse or approve and assumes no responsibility for the content of the information presented.